Recent Tasting Notes

Got a sample of this when I went into their Berkeley store. The first steep was super flavorful! They aren’t kidding when they describe it as tropical. The lichee is very distinct and the tea is really smooth and balanced. I could have gone lighter on the sugar, but I was in a rush to get out of the house with tea on the go and just spooned it in quickly and thoughtlessly. The second steep isn’t as nice as the first. There is a strange taste to it like stale water or something. Maybe I need to clean my kettle, but I’m chalking the second steep tasting odd to user error for now.

Preparation

This is a very lovely tea. This might actually be one of the highest ratings I’ve ever given!

Lovely complexity of taste in a subtle shade. I’m very thankful I followed the brewing instructions as the almost clear liquor packs a distinctively flavorful kick. Really this is what green teas should taste like.

Vegetal notes with subtle floral. Its hard to distinguish between (I got bok choy and spring peas, as well as green bell peppers as it brewed longer, all with the sweetness of roasted chestnuts and faint gardenia/rose). Really this is an amazing tea.

My one concern was that the price was a little high, but if someone bought this for me…(hint hint), I would gladly accept. ;)

Do you ever have a craving for a certain flavor, but every tea you brew up misses the mark? That’s what happened today until I made this tea. This tea is so yummy! Before I made this one, I brewed up two separate green teas, thinking that was the flavor profile I wanted. Turns out, what I really wanted was a green oolong. I love oolong. Green, roasty, or other, I enjoy oolong. This one is a great oolong and I’m finally satisfied. ;)

My coworker generously gave me pretty much an entire bag of this tea yesterday. When I asked her why she was giving it away, she said although she likes it, her husband doesn’t, and they typically enjoy tea together. They’re so cute! Honestly, this does not look like it was a cheap tea, so I feel a little bad about taking it all. It was harvested in 2009, though, and it appears that Teance has a recent 2013 harvest available, so not sure how long she’s had it. Ha!

I really enjoyed 3 steeps of this today. It’s yummy! And no worries, it doesn’t taste stale. ;) I got buttery, vegetal, and some floral notes. Very smooth and thick. I think the vegetal note is like an artichoke, although I’m still working at refining my palate. Overall, a very enjoyable oolong that I am happy to add to my cupboard! :)

Got this tea thanks to the ever generous Auggy and I must say it was one of the ones I was most excited to try. However, pretty descriptions does not a pleasant tea make, because…

This tea sounds a lot more impressive than how it tastes. Mostly, I am getting hay. Hay with maybe a hint of not particularly distinct floral. The tea itself tastes of the smell of hay, if that makes sense. And…I’m thinking raisins?

I dunno. I used the entire sample and, much like my prior log, am finding this not unpleasant, but altogether unremarkable.

Is it because I’m so tired? I feel slightly guilty that these teas might be served a light injustice via my fatigue, and so I’m going to call it a night and leave these both sans ratings.

In an effort to catch up, I am going to officially declare tomorrow Tea Day. Down with turkey! Up with tea! And up with being awake enough to pay attention when I’m drinking tea and cogent enough to log them without writing idiotic logs. Time to go to sleep to the dulcet tones of Vince Guaraldi. How is it that A Charlie Brown Christmas is so simultaneously dull and comforting at the same time? It’s a holiday tranquilizer.

Additional notes: Having the last tuocha of this one that I’ve been hoarding. My tea brain just had an earthquake when I realized that this was a raw pu-erh and not ripened. Up to this point, I thought it wasn’t raw. I’m glad I realized in time and didn’t ruin it. This is the best rice flavor I’ve found, and it does seem to have an additional rice element instead of it just being infused with flavor. This is a very likeable buttery raw pu-erh, but any raw won’t stack up to ripened. But it must be a good one if I’ve remembered this raw tuchoa being better than any ripened.

CharlotteZero sent me a couple of these little things to try. I really appreciate it — thank you! I’m just now trying them, since this was my first little pu-erh cake and I was a bit intimidated. But it’s a rainy day here, so I thought this one would be nice to try. Originally I thought I should cut it in half or something, since I would be brewing western style… but the cake looks like a teaspoon sized bird nest anyway. So I rinsed the mini cake for a few seconds (until the cake was saturated) and poured out that water.

Steep #1: I waited a few minutes for the water to cool to pour the mug about 3/4 of the way full for maybe 10 seconds and took out the infuser. That may have been a couple seconds too long (according to the tiny bit of astringency.) But the flavor is exactly what I expected a “sweet rice” to be. It’s kind of like kettle corn! Just a bit less sugary sweet.(“Kettle corn’s a fun time snack!” says Troy from ‘Community’.) The pu-erh itself is hardly noticeable. There isn’t much of a typical pu-erh flavor, letting the sweet rice really shine through.

Steep #2: Eight seconds with the mug half full of water. This one is just as tasty. It’s so buttery. I could swear I was tasting some green tea here though.. which might be where the astringency is coming from. I’m not finding the “dark, earthy” taste from the description though. The leaves are entirely out of the little nest now.

A BUNCH more steeps around ten seconds with the mug half filled all tasted the same. Just as delicious and buttery! Then I steeped once at 20 seconds which seemed even more buttery… which led to:

The last steep: I decided to go with Teance’s instructions and brew this for two minutes with a full mug of water. It still has that buttery flavor, but it tastes a bit more like a pu-erh now. The one that I had from Verdant anyway: a bit like some sort of woodchip, in a nice way! It is still very mild flavored!

I have one more of this little cakes that I will save to savor! ( I think I just like saying “little cakes”.) I thought about buying some more of these but yowzas, these aren’t cheap… though they might be the cheapest thing on Teance’s site. I enjoyed this immensely though!

The dry leaves are green-white finely rolled balls; they unfold somewhat but not completely when brewed to reveal high-quality full leaves.

It produces a golden-white liquor that honestly reminds me more of white than green tea.

The leaves and liquor share a fresh vegetal scent with strong floral/jasmine notes.

Astringency is extremely muted.

The dominant flavors are jasmine (surprise) and a fruity taste. I’d say it’s melon of some sort. There’s also a pleasant, mellow vegetal taste that I could say is snap peas or something like that. Unfortunately, to some degree the jasmine overpowers the vegetal notes. I do not have much experience with jasmine greens, so I do not know if this is a flaw of this tea or of jasmine greens in general.

I did a second steep, for 3 minutes instead of two. I noticed more of the melon-like flavor. It’s almost a green apple flavor on this steep. The jasmine’s definitely still there. I could say there’s something almost soapy about this tea. I wouldn’t call it that, but it’s bordering on that. I believe the potential issue is that the jasmine flavor is very strong and to some extent overpowering the green tea base. This is not to say it’s not a good tea – I like it a lot – but I would like the jasmine to be a bit milder.

Since Teance is close by, I’ve stopped in there store to drink gong-fu style tea at their tea bar a number of times. The quality of the teas is always very good, but I’ve refrained from buying any due to their steep prices. Then I found this tea in a local store for literally around half of its price in-store. So I bought it. I am thoroughly happy with it, although it’s not mind-blowing. Its most distinctive feature is its sweetness, which is really quite pronounced.

I’m almost out of this tea (very sad), but I’m excitedly looking forward to the Spring 2013 teas!

I don’t drink a lot of Darjeeling. This may be the only Darjeeling that I have had more than once. So, take this rating with an especially minuscule grain of salt. It has a savory aroma (as described) and a floral note that reminds me of roses after a cool spring rain. It is light bodied with a pleasant astringency. I think I finally understand what people are talking about when they speak of a “muscatel” note. When I smelled this tea, I was momentarily transported to a night this past summer when I opened a Martinelli Muscat Alexandria for some friends of mine.

This is a wonderful tea if you want something to drink many cups of or to go with food. (I brewed up a big pot of this at around 11AM to drink with my breakfast of curried lentils and rice.) I guess I should also note that this tea had a lot of broken pieces in it and really clogged up the narrow slots of my glass infuser.

Oh look, a backlog. A very backlogged backlog actually wot I actually wrote two weeks ago. But there you are. Also, my formatting appears to have been stripped at some point… Deal with it.

Here’s another one from Auggy. I feel a bit like I’m neglecting Hesper June’s parcel, but Auggy sent me so many!

Auggy and I have discovered on several occasions that on the subject of black tea we tend to be Taste Twins. We like so many of the same ones, and we seem to look for the same qualities in them. The one where we’re the most different is probably Assam. I’m slightly sceptical about Assam. Not because flavour as such, because I do agree with her that Assam can produce an immensely good cup. I like it, when it’s well brewed.

Unfortunately, it does not always like me, and that well-brewed cup is diffciult for me to attain. Even when I think I follow all instructions to the letter, it’s still sometimes a game of chance whether I get a good, pleasant cup, or something just a smidge too astringent and bitter. This is actually a big reason for why I prefer the Chinese black teas over all others. They’re idiot-proof. Some of them, although not all, are almost completely impossible to ruin.

So I’m going at this one with some degree of caution.

The leaves smell nice. Slightly woodsy, and quite malty, and this repeats itself in the brewed cup. Emphasis on malty. Many Assams, when I’ve managed to get a good cup, have for me had a strong note of raisins or similar dried fruit, but I’m not finding any such thing in the aroma here. I kind of miss it a bit. It feels a little like there an element missing.

To my relief, the raisin note is there in the flavour though, and it’s the first one I encounter when sipping, followed shortly by a fairly long malty note with a woodsy highlight. I’ve just had pancakes for breakfast, so I’m not currently capable of detecting any other aftertaste other than pancakes. As it cools a little it does develop that particular note that I think is what Auggy describes as ‘good cardboard’, and I can see what she means by that description.

Ok I’m going to come back and write a better review later but I’ve been a bit obsessed with this tea since I got back from Berkeley where I got it from Teance.

3 word review—

Honey
Nut
Cheerios

Ok maybe a bit longer than that. I want to explain that this is a very good thing. It’s subtle not in your face but the sweet nutty flavors are there under the beautiful oolong exterior. I definitely get some grain notes that further emphasize the cheerio-ness I’m getting from it. Don’t get me wrong it’s no where close to being a flavored tea, not that I don’t enjoyed my 52teas(psst Frank, a honey nut cheerio green would be lovely me thinks)

Yesterday we made a trek to Teance in Berkeley which is definitely one of the more upscale tea places I have ever been to (with prices to match)

I decided I needed to pick up one of these little fragrant leaf shengs, it sounded so appealing from the description and the bamboo leaf wrapping could not be cuter…

I threw the first steep of this away after I realized I forgot to rinse it. The second steep here is pretty nice, I am getting the sticky rice aroma for sure, there is a slightly sweet taste with quite a bit of astringency in the finish. Slightly earthy. I steeped it for around 2 minutes basket style, I will try for less steeping next time around. It is a very young sheng but I liked it. My rating might go up when I’ve had the chance to do a proper gong fu tasting.

Third steep here has gotten a lot lighter with some more fruity/apple flavors…

Preparation

Xing Ren Xiang is an interesting creature among the Dancongs for me. I’ve only had a few Almond Fragrance Phoenix Oolongs – two from other companies and three from Teance. Each so far has held a significantly greener character than the other Dancongs I’ve had. It’s been a good long while since opening this bag, so I might as well give it a go. I really do not worry about year of harvest with Wuyi Yancha or Dancongs, but harvest time is interesting for me. Winter harvest versus spring harvest makes for a pretty dramatic shift and in the realm of many oolongs this is felt easily as a contrast between teas expressing aromatics versus teas expressing body or tactile dynamics. In dancongs, most winter harvest teas I’ve had certainly seem higher in astringency when compared to spring harvest, but I don’t really get as wide a spread in expressiveness of flavor characteristics in the spring tea. Flavor consistency and slightly easier brewing can be a good thing, for sure, but I typically go for a dancong when I want each cup to lend something different compared to the cup before. Unfortunately, greater aromatic expressiveness doesn’t mean aromatic steadfastness and some of the highly aromatic winter teas that change and shift so dramatically do not necessarily carry the same durability as spring harvest teas. 6-9 infusions sure is plenty (especially to wrap up a day full of drinking tea like today) but is kinda wussy compared to the 15-20 I’ve managed to coax out of some other Phoenix Oolongs prepared at high concentrations.

While this group of oolongs is generally categorized as “medium oxidized” due to dry leaf appearance and liquor intensity, looking at the infused leaves typically tells a different story. Most dancongs I’ve had range between 20-30% oxidation, with only those labeled Song Zhong Dancong exceeding this just slightly and “commercial grade teas” reaching higher. O’course, percent oxidation is largely speculative and just based on an estimate of what percentage of the infused leaf appears reddish, not really how long or in what stages it is carried out by a tea maker and does not necessarily translate to direct expression of certain characteristics. As it stands, lighter ox dancongs or – more importantly – less completely dried/cured ones tend to have more intense fragrances up front but aromas may dissipate in a shorter time frame. More completely cured teas may seem even better after a year or two from processing while higher moisture content examples stale a bit just after half a year. This tea falls in the latter group and has definitely changed considerably in dry fragrance. However, staling of one set of characteristics does not necessarily make for flat tea, and this had an overabundance of taste elements that have mellowed nicely.

Another thing about my preference for dancongs lies in my brewing style. I start off with a gongfu mentality and then screw it way up. While I sometimes use an appropriate 4-6g per 100mL, I do like to use absurd concentrations of 8-10g for really short steeps following a double rinse. Tonight I’m using 10g in 100-120mL water at 90C with infusions following a double rinse.

Picture of the leaves from the website is all wrong… These are very green leaves with yellow veins. Very long, intact twisted leaves that can’t fit in even a very shallow tablespoon, let alone a teaspoon.
Dry fragrance is pleasantly floral and lightly nutty (more akin to pumpkin seed than almond, though).
Wet leaf aroma hits almond on the head, but not the nut. The wet leaves give off a heady perfume of an almond tree orchard in full bloom. A truly wonderful aroma I associate with warm evening breezes in the Central Valley (one of the very few pleasant aromas to come from the agriculture there, really).
Liquor aroma holds true to the wet leaf aroma – now how rare is that? Usually the lid of the gaiwan can give a good preview to an infusion’s aromatic expression, but the leaves tell a totally different tale.

Fourth infusion (10sec):
Much more intense – tannic.
Kind of a rust-like metal and peach pit tang.
Grape skin astringency.
Refreshing lingering crispness similar to taste of cool fog over a gravel road or the air right after it has finished raining on concrete.

I could get a few more infusions out of this (prolly three more good’uns) but it’s late and I’ve gotta work tomorrow.
Pretty darn vegetal example of a Phoenix Oolong. It’s muted a bit since I first bought it, but in a good way. Takes a while for anything resembling almond nuts to pop up in the characteristics of this tea, but the aroma of almond blossoms starts off heady and sticks as a background character in the nose throughout the brews. Really good tea and it keeps shifting nicely. Can be a bit intense, but short brews help out in this regard. I’m kinda doubting that what is being sold on the Teance website is Winter 2010 like it’s labeled, since it’s left their listing and come back since then. What I’m drinking here I bought last year in late winter and the bag was stamped as “new harvest” so I am thinking there might be a website mistake. Either way, it’s changed since I got it but it’s still very good.

Preparation

Mm.. boysenberry is a word I’ve been looking for describe Dan Cong lately. A friend of mine just sent over a bundle of Dan Cong as a gift for Chinese new year, and some Xin Ren Xiang made it into my gaiwan just this weekend. I am pleased to see the style available elsewhere, as I loved the small sampling.
Definitely with you on the double-stuffed gaiwan approach. It is thrilling, and oftentimes one of the most rewarding types of tea sessions. I’ve also been finding myself drawn towards tea (in general) with long and dynamic steep-lives.
Loving your notes. Glad to see you back.

Really great notes, Thomas! I’ve been tasting a superb array of dancong samples at work, which we asked our sourcing agent in China to assemble and send to us recently. The orignal plan was to select one more dancong to add to our offerings, but the quality of the samples across the twenty or so varieties we received has been too high to make one choice a realistic possibility. So the idea of choosing one grew into choosing only three more to carry in the near future, and even that has been a bit painful. A Xing Ren Xiang has been one of the prime candidates, the other two being a Tong Tien Xiang and a Bai Ye.

In any case, the Xing Ren Xiang that we sampled really floored me, and I found that it definitely had almond characteristics from beginning to end. Though it wasn’t a simple and consistent picture of almond, but rather a transforming set of variations on aspects of almond. The initial experience of fragrance and flavor had distinct amaretto notes, along with that somewhat cherry-like top note in almond extract. It later unfolded into blanched and then raw full-skin almond flavor notes. I vividly remember taking the first inhalation of the first-steep bouquet on the underside of my gaiwan lid, and being very impressed with the dimensionality and deep layering of its fragrance, which took about 5-10 seconds for my brain to fully unfold. A truly intoxicating experience. I hope we do bring this one in for sale at some point, but I think we’re likely going to introduce one of the others first.

In any case, I love the wealth of information you provided in this note, especially because dancong is a particular obsession of mine now. I think you’d be fantastic drinking company, by the way. If you ever happen to pass through Minneapolis, I’d be happy to welcome you over for some gongfu cha. I also see that you’re in the process of sourcing some tea selections for this cafe you work for. If you ever want to try Verdant’s wholesale offerings, send me a PM and I’d be happy discuss the possibility of sending you a wholesale sampler kit based on what you’re looking for.

its conversations like this one that really make the love of tea an inspiration and a community…its enough to make the linkage of people, from plant to plucking, withering to steeping, seller to buyer, random monk to blessed wanderer such a journey that its easy to be grateful for each step and each stone…thanks for making this medium a celebrational expression

I absolutely love this oolong. It is light, floral, and citrusy. I love the fact that each steeping gives a new flavor profile. When I serve this tea to guests, they are always amazed at its yumminess.

This tea is a perfect compromise between too light and too astringent. It is subtly nutty, and my friends have referred to it as somewhat “twiggy”. I love it. It is very calming, and the caffeine level is moderate enough to keep you alert but not to negatively offset your daily energy level.

Preparation

I could drink this tea at any time of the day, which makes it very likable. It may not have a strong taste, but I like it that way. It is a little light on the floral flavor, however you can still taste “something” after each drink. I enjoy the subtly of the flavor. I was especially impressed with the number of times I could steep this tea. Even after my fourth steep I found the taste to be just as potent as the first steep.

Some places suggest a steep time of about 1 minute. I personally enjoy adding an extra 30 seconds to bring out the taste a little more. This is some pretty tasty tea – although I am a bit in favor of oolongs in general. Overall it’s a good tea that I think the general public, including non-tea drinkers wouldn’t mind trying.

Preparation

This is a really tasteful tea. I particular enjoy drinking it after a heavy meal. The colorful and floral flavors makes it a pleasant drink for any occasion. I find that the floral taste really comes out when you drink take your time with drinking the tea. Take a breath in, take a sip, swallow, and breath out – it really brings out the color of this tea. Definitely a keeper.

Preparation

Pu-erh is one of those things I really enjoy, but I wish it didn’t last for so many steeps since I just don’t drink that many cups of hot tea most days. I had three cups at work, and I’m going to have a fourth before the day is over, but by tomorrow the leaves won’t be any good for the 5th, 6th, 7th steepings that I know it’s capable of.

Anyway, after rinsing with hot water, the first steep was a pretty mahogany color, but not as developed and rich as the 2nd and 3rd steeps were. The second and third looked like soy sauce because the button of leaves had broken apart. In that first steep and a little in the second too, I always get that very distinct dashi stock smell. It makes me feel like I’m drinking the broth from my signature udon noodle soup. After the first fishy cup, it starts to mellow out and get that ‘deeper’ flavor. Kind of malty and almost chocolaty. I am still surprised by the complete lack of astringency in pu-erhs.

As crude as it is to say pu-erh tastes like dirt, I really mean it in the best way possible. It tastes like rich, nutritious, alive soil. Soil where the earth itself is born and reborn.

I prepared this one identically to the last pu-erh I tried (see notes on Ancient Pu-erh Tuo Cha by Rishi), rinsing and making lots and lots of short infusions.

At first, I got a smell of dashi (Japanese fish stock), salty, savory, and yes, fishy. The first steeps were a little bit like rich soil, but right now on my fourth steep I’m getting a distinct smooth unsweet cocoa flavor. It’s not bad. In many ways it’s similar to Rishi’s. I like the robustness on this cold Texas morning. Currently it’s 43 degrees outside and I’m in flannel pajama pants with the heater on!

The last few days have been batshit crazy with apartment problems. First it was a leak in the ceiling, then it was water bubbling up from the floor. Then it was a bathtub that wouldn’t drain. Then it was a snapped off toilet handle. Then it was a screen door that won’t open. Did I mention that all these things happened in a 48 hour period? Now we’ve discovered that water from the leaky upstairs AC unit has not only been dripping through the ceiling, but has been seeping down into the wall behind boxes in our bedroom closet and hallway closet for god knows how long. Several ruined pairs of leather shoes, tote bags, blankets, and an old vacuum later, half of our apartment is currently torn apart awaiting the repair man to come back for the third day in a row and replace our carpet. So yeah, I needed something calming this morning.

I reached for this silver needle and blended it with some dried lavender flowers from Central Market (35 cents for half an ounce!) in hopes of a soothing start to the day. It tasted nice, but I definitely overdid the lavender since I could barely taste the white tea. The combination is promising, and it satisfies my desire for this tea to taste more floral.